Carell plays the title character, and proceedings kick off in 1982 with Burt being bullied on his birthday. A miserable, lonely child, his life changes on the day that he is given a magic set.

Soon he’s producing pennies from his nose and coins from his ears, and before you can say ‘abracadabra’ young Burt has forged a friendship with fellow outcast Anton – who's apparently ‘dangerously close to being a girl’ – and the pair are vowing to make magic their life.

Flash-forward 20 years and Burt Wonderstone and Anton Marvelton are blowing Las Vegas audiences away with their spectacular onstage illusions. Think Siegfried and Roy without the potentially lethal cats.

Flash-forward another decade, however, and all is not well on the strip, with fame, fortune and gallons of hair-spray turning Burt into a domineering, womanizing, pompous prima donna.

His foul behaviour threatens to tear the friendship apart, and matters are made worse when ‘Brain Rapist’ Steve Gray arrives in town.

A cross between David Blaine and Criss Angel, Gray is an edgy street performer who doesn’t just walk across hot coals, he sleeps on them.

His overnight success causes the double act’s audiences to dwindle and tickets sales to fall, and when they try to imitate Gray’s illusions, disaster strikes – Burt and Anton argue, and the partnership is dissolved for good.

What follows is a painfully predictable tale of rehabilitation and redemption as Burt is forced to reassess his life and rediscover his humility.

The trouble is, his early transition from browbeaten nerd into raging a-hole is so sudden and dramatic that his character just doesn’t ring true, making it hard to care about his plight in the film’s latter stages.

Indeed Anton – masterfully underplayed by Steve Buscemi – seems like the more interesting of the characters, most notably when he’s visiting Africa to teach tricks to the poor and starving.

As far as other performances go, Alan Arkin is wonderfully cantankerous as the cynical Holloway, while Olivia Wilde is wasted as the token love interest. James Gandolfini fares better as a casino owner who’s a cuddly version of Tony Soprano, while Jay Mohr delivers a downright terrible turn as a barfly magician, though that may be due to the mirth-free dialogue he's given.

That said, screenwriters Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley craft enough jokes to make the movie a worthwhile watch, though a few too many of their gags rely on repetition for laughs.

And director Don Scardino – best known for TV’s 30 Rock – keeps things moving at a brisk pace to ensure the film doesn’t outstay its welcome.

But with the pedigree of the talent involved, Burt Wonderstone feels like a missed opportunity, the film less ‘Incredible’ and more ‘Pleasant But Only Intermittently Funny.’ Though admittedly that would have looked terrible on the poster.

The Verdict

Jim Carrey wins the battle of the warring magicians in a comedy that should have been funnier.